Disk Shipping Container With Flexible Fins and Shrink Wrap
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Solution Overview
Problem
Conventional shipping containers for disk-shaped articles, such as hard disk drive media, cause abrasive wear and contamination due to their design, which fails to adequately protect these sensitive items during transportation and storage.
Innovation Solution
A container with a cassette design featuring dividers, pads, and a top lid with resiliently flexible fins that contact the articles only during shrink-wrapping, minimizing contact and wear, and a method of shipping that involves locating the articles in slots, supporting them on pads, and using shrink-wrap to secure the fins and vertical-containment walls in contact with the articles for secure transport.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Reliability
If conventional containers are used to secure and protect disk-shaped articles during transportation, then the articles are constrained and protected from movement, but the articles suffer from abrasive wear and contamination
Solution Approach 1:
The patent employs a flexible shrink-wrap film that conforms to the shape of the disk-shaped articles and container, creating a protective barrier without rigid contact points that would cause abrasion. The film wraps around the entire assembly, securing articles while maintaining a soft, non-abrasive interface.
Solution Approach 2:
The shrink-wrap film acts as an intermediary between the rigid container structure and the sensitive disk-shaped articles. It provides the necessary constraint and protection while eliminating direct contact between hard container surfaces and the articles, thus preventing abrasive wear and contamination.
2Ease of operation
If rigid structures are used to constrain lateral movement of disk-shaped articles, then the articles are securely immobilized, but contact points create abrasive wear
Solution Approach 1:
Instead of rigid constraints, the patent uses a flexible shrink-wrap film that provides lateral constraint through its elastic properties. The film wraps around the articles and container, creating friction-based restraint without hard contact points, thus immobilizing articles while preventing abrasive wear.
Solution Approach 2:
The patent changes the mechanical parameters of the constraint system from rigid to flexible. The shrink-wrap film has variable stiffness that adapts to the articles it encloses, providing sufficient constraint force while maintaining a soft contact interface that prevents abrasion.
3Reliability
If continuous contact between container components and disk-shaped articles is maintained, then the articles are securely retained, but wear and contamination increase
Solution Approach 1:
The shrink-wrap film provides continuous retention through its wrapping configuration and elastic tension, creating a protective envelope around the articles. This flexible continuous contact prevents articles from moving or falling out while avoiding the abrasive effects of rigid continuous contact.
Solution Approach 2:
The flexible film serves as a mediating layer between the container structure and the articles, providing continuous retention forces through its elastic properties while preventing direct contact between rigid surfaces and the articles, thus eliminating wear and contamination from continuous contact.
Applied Scientific Principles
This section explains which scientific principles are used to turn an abstract innovation direction into a practical engineering solution.
Function Achieved in This Case
The solution significantly reduces abrasive wear and contamination of disk-shaped articles by minimizing contact with the container's components during handling and transport, ensuring secure and protective shipping.
Implementation Method 1
the top lid comprises resiliently flexible fins. When the top lid is fully coupled to the cassette, the disk-shaped articles are supported on the pads, and the container is shrink-wrapped, the resiliently flexible fins contact and are flexed against the disk-shaped articles
Data Source
AI summary
Disclosed herein is a container for shipping disk-shaped articles. The container comprises a cassette comprising a top opening, a plurality of dividers that define slots therebetween for receiving disk-shaped articles and constraining lateral movement of the disk-shaped articles, and pads for supporting the disk-shaped articles and constraining downward vertical movement of the disk-shaped articles. The container also comprises a top lid coupleable to the cassette over the top opening and comprising resiliently flexible fins. When the top lid is fully coupled to the cassette, the disk-shaped articles are supported on the pads, and the container is not shrink-wrapped, an unoccupied gap is defined between the resiliently flexible fins and the disk-shaped articles. When the top lid is fully coupled to the cassette, the disk-shaped articles are supported on the pads, and the container is shrink-wrapped, the resiliently flexible fins contact and are flexed against the disk-shaped articles.